This is so short... (I's sorry!) B-but I'm definitely working toward an end. It'll probably be about... 3 more chapters? Give or take one. :)

Izaya generally avoided alcohol. It was excellent for loosening the lips of secretive humans, of course, but that was because of its potent ability to quell all common sense. The informant needed to be alert to his surroundings at all times, needed to reason his way through every word, thought, and action. Drink hindered his ability to do that, his job, so he abstained from it most of the time – it was as simple as that.

Besides – Izaya wasn't the same as the pathetic humans who needed shots and bottles to get them through a day. His vices were not so base, and he was not so weak. Not so damaged, not in that much pain, not so severely lacking coherence.

Given all of that, then, what was with this situation?

So much for rationality, Izaya mocked himself – bitter, lost, and bored, he was standing in front of a dilapidated old bar. Neon lights flashing almost invisibly, eclipsed as they were by the light of the sun – still loitering at the height of the dome of white-on-blue sky – and weeds leering up at the informant from spacious cracks in the sidewalk.

The informant was still curious, of course. He still wanted to know what was happening in this city, and he needed to be involved in it for his own sake. He was searching, really he was, but – well, this was just how things were for him lately. He cared. He did. But he cared a little bit less than he once had, and – what was the point – no great obstacle, no flash of dyed-blonde hair or flying vending machines to hold him back? Hell, he wasn't even sure where he was, now. When had he forgotten the names of Ikebukuro's streets?

Well – maybe around the same time that he started to find that it was difficult – almost impossible, even – to maintain a vested interest in much of anything for very long.

And what was he looking for, anyway? Was it anything tangible? Did he care about the reality at all, or was he simply looking for lies to lose himself in? Izaya had already admitted to himself that it was a fantasy which had drawn him out of his office today. Long before that, he had considered the possibility of heaven, had accepted without much surprise the existence of all sorts of supernatural phenomena in Ikebukuro.

Still, he didn't believe in ghosts, spirits, zombies – death was a permanent state, after all, and no afterlife could include a return to the transient world of the living.

If he believed in something like that and it turned out to be false, after all, the informant couldn't hope to recover.

What, then, was he doing? How could going inside now and drinking himself silly be any more pointless, any more ridiculously stupid than wandering without the motivation to conduct a proper investigation? How could it be worse than walking right on past those friends of Dotachin's – Karisawa and Yumasaki, the infamous otaku couple – in spite of their obvious excitement? Something had to have been up – it could have mattered. Why hadn't he bothered?

Might as well drink and forget and be lost as hell – sounded a lot better than aching feet and more empty actions.

He did – the door creaked loudly as it fell away from him, clicked shut and the bell that was needlessly attached to it announced his presence to no one. Finding the inside of the bar almost intolerably dark compared to the scintillation-on-all-sides of just moments ago, Izaya virtually had to stumble his way to the counter – as if he were drunk already, he realized, and the thought almost made him eager to feel real intoxication.

"Whatever's got the most alcohol," he muttered to the bartender – damn that uniform, too, and now the informant was doubly prepared for some stumbling inebriation. Not to forget… no, it was – a temporary escape. A one-time thing.

"Don't you think it's a bit early for that?"

"If you think so," Izaya grumbled irritably, "why do you bother staying open all day?"

The man paused in his drying of a just-washed shot glass and laughed. "Who knows? Maybe it's because we expect people like you to drop by from time to time."

The informant only sighed. He didn't feel the need to explain that he wasn't like other people – didn't matter, did it, and he would be – for a while, just the same as any other down-and-out failure. Couldn't be too bad, right? A new experience, an investigation. Living a little, or something.

He had motivation enough for that, at least.

Because – because, just who was he kidding? There was no Shizuo, no hope or redemption in this city. He was lost – really lost, in every sense of the word, and he would only ever get himself more lost. Wasn't like drinking would improve his sense of direction, after all.

It could only make him forget – everything, and he laughed at the thought. He could feel it all slipping away – like water, like his name and his past and it was only temporary but what had Shizuo's problem been, back when –

"No," Izaya whispered. His stomach churned. "Shizu-chan, how come…"

Why the hell – everything, but you – Shizu-chan, you won't…

You won't disappear…

The bar was quiet – no other customers, no buzz of conversation or cacophony of human movement. None of the city's noise reached Izaya in his conscious stupor – drink after drink, ignored suggestions that he quit and the edges of his awareness all fuzzy and buzzing hotly – and for once he was oblivious because he chose to be.

There was just one awareness which he couldn't quell, not hours later – falling all over himself, mysteriously unable to see straight – not the moment he left the bar and not when he stumbled into the arms of someone on the sidewalk outside –

Blonde hair, blue eyes – startled, his voice vibrating in his chest and Izaya held close enough to feel that.

Ah, so this was what alcohol could do. This was – forgetting. It was hallucinating warmth and having a conversation with an imaginary ghost. It was his name not being called – but hearing it anyway and explaining himself to an illusion – "'S your fault, Shizu-chan. I hadta drink – 'cause I missed you…"

It was being carried back to his office on the back of a Heiwajima Shizuo who – just for now – had never really died.

Please, Shizu-chan… don't let me forget this… when I wake up…